Update on FMB: I have applied for the wild card qualifier of the FMB world championship in the 15kg class! Yay! Not sure if that's a guaranteed entry into the qualifier though, as a lot of other 15kg bots will probably be applying for it as well. Will be waiting for the FMB guys to confirm on that. However, I can start building Contraption in the meantime. Some electrical parts have arrived today and I expect to begin some soldering and drivetrain testing very soon as I wait for the redone parts to come back.

Some thoughts after hearing about the changes done to Magnetar for this season of RW: Maybe I will just go with the old 16:1 P60 to start with so that the current draw is smaller and the esc is less stressed.

Sun Dec 10, 2017 11:35 pm

MoonSet416

Joined: 25 Sep 2016
Posts: 408
Location: Sydney

Hi guys I think I need some help here... I was trying to flash SimonK onto my ZTWs through Afro USB but Rapid Flash says "Firmware received, Connection successfully opened with ID: 6, Connection to the module failed, Successfully closed serial connection". What could have been the problem here?

Wed Dec 13, 2017 7:23 pm

MoonSet416

Joined: 25 Sep 2016
Posts: 408
Location: Sydney

Ah silly me I just needed to power my ESC with lipo. [facepalm]

Wed Dec 13, 2017 8:11 pm

MoonSet416

Joined: 25 Sep 2016
Posts: 408
Location: Sydney

Update:
I just received the redone parts and they are still crap. Don't know how they screwed it up a second time... As time is running out for me I may not be able to compete in FMB simply due to lousy machining.

Sat Dec 16, 2017 4:35 pm

NickExperienced Roboteer

Joined: 16 Jun 2004
Posts: 11791
Location: Sydney, NSW

That really sucks, particularly when the supplier must know what you expect this time! Got any photos that show the problem?_________________Australian 2015 Featherweight champion
UK 2016 Gladiator champion

Sat Dec 16, 2017 7:47 pm

MoonSet416

Joined: 25 Sep 2016
Posts: 408
Location: Sydney

Misaligned holes, round corners when I said they should be straight, lightening pockets missing, and threads missing.

file down.

So this is how twisted the frame is right now.

They also sent some of the previous batch back to me. Although those have problems, at least they do fit the rest of the frame well, just some round corners to

Sat Dec 16, 2017 7:57 pm

NickExperienced Roboteer

Joined: 16 Jun 2004
Posts: 11791
Location: Sydney, NSW

Wow, that's painful to look at! They must have profile milled all the aluminium parts and then not bothered to do a secondary operation to square up the inside corners - very slack. It looks to me that they did two passes around the parts and no finish pass._________________Australian 2015 Featherweight champion
UK 2016 Gladiator champion

Sat Dec 16, 2017 8:14 pm

MoonSet416

Joined: 25 Sep 2016
Posts: 408
Location: Sydney

Yep you're right. It's killing me inside.
The only good news is that the machinist offered to fit the chassis for me if I send the parts back. Hope he will do it the right way this time.

Sat Dec 16, 2017 9:41 pm

MoonSet416

Joined: 25 Sep 2016
Posts: 408
Location: Sydney

This idea came up a few weeks ago in the Chinese builder chat but no one really commented on it, so I would like to ask what you guys think of this: wrapping ESCs and other stuff in cooling silicone tape instead of the stock heat shrink. The original intent of this was to provide cooling and cushioning at the same time.

Sun Dec 17, 2017 8:24 pm

MoonSet416

Joined: 25 Sep 2016
Posts: 408
Location: Sydney

Plot twist: It just turns out that one of my relatives is actually a former machinist and can find ppl to do my future parts. I was like "ah it's that guy at the family meeting XX years ago".

Mon Dec 18, 2017 11:55 pm

maddox

Joined: 21 Dec 2006
Posts: 773
Location: Belgium

You can't do much worse than the current supplier.

Tue Dec 19, 2017 4:25 pm

MoonSet416

Joined: 25 Sep 2016
Posts: 408
Location: Sydney

Update:
Just spent half an hour hammering the P60 pinion onto my motor shaft and it turns out that Banebots gave me the wrong pinions! The 1:13 P60 should use the same pinions as the 1:16 ones as those ones fit perfectly. The ones that came with my new gearboxes seem to fit the second stage (the one closer to the output shaft) of the gearbox pretty well though.

Wed Dec 20, 2017 5:45 pm

Jackbk

Joined: 07 Aug 2013
Posts: 22
Location: New Zealand

That sucks, will you be able to get replacements to China in time?

They sent me the wrong pinions too last time, then proceeded to ignore my emails and messages until I gave up and just bought the right ones. Pretty poor service.

Also, I'm not sure hammering is the strat for putting pinions on... have you got a press or a bench vice handy?_________________2017 August FMB 15kg 2nd place
2016 Robowars Australia 1st & 2nd place

Thu Dec 21, 2017 10:55 am

MoonSet416

Joined: 25 Sep 2016
Posts: 408
Location: Sydney

Very luckily I still have my old 775 motors which have the right pinions on them, I need to pull those off and install them. If this was my first time buying P60s my bot would have been doomed considering how slow it is to get things from the US (it's slow enough from the US to Australia and it will only get worse in China).

Sad to hear that... Maybe it's time to have some metric P60s (I think the Salted Fish guys are working on that).

Yep can confirm hammering isn't quite the right way. I had to hammer the shaft the other way after installing. Will probably get something like a press soon.